Unary coding: Difference between revisions

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{{Short description|Entropy encoding}}

'''Unary coding''',<ref group="nb" name="NB1"/> or the [[unary numeral system]], is an [[entropy encoding]] that represents a [[natural number]], ''n'', with ''n'' ones followed by a zero (if the term ''natural number'' is understood as ''non-negative integer'') or with ''n''&nbsp;&minus;&nbsp;1 ones followed by a zero (if the term ''natural number'' is understood as ''strictly positive integer''). A unary number's code length would thus be ''n''&nbsp;+&nbsp;1 with that first definition, or ''n'' with that second definition. A unary code is sometimes called a '''thermometer code''', because a unaryUnary code writtenwhen verticallyvertical behaves like mercury in a [[thermometer]] that gets taller or shorter as ''n'' gets bigger or smaller, and so is sometimes called '''thermometer code'''.<ref>{{Cite web |title=University of Alberta Dictionary of Cognitive Science: Thermometer Code |url=http://www.bcp.psych.ualberta.ca/~mike/Pearl_Street/Dictionary/contents/T/thermcode.html |access-date=2025-05-31 |website=www.bcp.psych.ualberta.ca}}</ref> An alternative representation uses ''n'' or ''n''&nbsp;&minus;&nbsp;1 zeros followed by a one, effectively swapping the ones and zeros, [[without loss of generality]]. For example, the first ten unary codes are:

{| class="wikitable"

! Unary code !! Alternative

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== Canonical unary codes ==

{{See also|Canonical Huffman code}}

For unary values where the maximum is known, one can use canonical unary codes that are of a somewhat numerical nature and different from character based codes. It involves starting with numerical '0' or '-1' ( <math>\operatorname2^{n} - 1\,</math>) and the maximum number of digits then for each step reducing the number of digits by one and increasing/decreasing the result by numerical '1'.

For unary values where the maximum is known, one can use canonical unary codes that are of a somewhat numerical nature and different from character based codes. The largest ''n'' numerical '0' or '-1' ( <math>\operatorname2^{n} - 1\,</math>) and the maximum number of digits then for each step reducing the number of digits by one and increasing/decreasing the result by numerical '1'.{{Clarify|date=May 2025|reason=(1) Poor grammar. (2) Are canonical codes only for the positive natural number convention? (3) Shouldn't this say that we are starting with the largest n for this 0 or 2^(n-1) code? (4) Why use red to write the final code (in this example corresponding to n=10)? Does it belong or not belong to the canonical format? (6) Why is there an extra row after the n=10 row? (Shouldn't we delete that empty row to indicate that there are no more codes after the maximum?) (7) Is the maximum code corresponding to n=10 or n=9, which this table both uses 9 digits to express. (We should delete this n=10 row if is beyond the maximum...the algorithm part about "reducing the number of digits by one" would only make sense if 9 is the maximum.)}}

{| class="wikitable"

! n !! Unary code

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Canonical codes can [http://www.cs.ucf.edu/courses/cap5015/Huff.pdf require less processing time to decode]{{Clarification|reason=Citation deals with [[Canonical Huffman code]]. Is the statement relevant only for when dealing with [[Huffman encoding]], or is this a general statement about Canonical unary code?|date=May 2025}} when they are processed as numbers not a string. If the number of codes required per symbol length is different to 1, i.e. there are more non-unary codes of some length required, those would be achieved by increasing/decreasing the values numerically without reducing the length in that case.

==Generalized unary coding==